The Veils of Eternity
by sniggles
Summary: A "Two Cathedrals" post-ep. from some of the POVs of the players.


I don't own them - Aaron Benjamin Sorkin does. Lucky him. And the lyrics are the English translation of "La Luna" from Sarah Brightman's CD "La Luna" and are by Chiara Ferrau.  
  
This is a "18th and Potomac" and "Two Cathedrals" post-ep, as told from several different points of view, which should be clear as you read.  
  
  
"The Veils of Eternity"  
by Rebecca A. Anderson  
sniggles@claudia-jean.net  
June 2001  
  
  
~~~~  
The night falls, silence.  
The darkness breathes quietly  
Just the moon will be awake  
It will cover us in silver  
It will shine from the great sky  
Just the moon will be awake...  
~~~~  
  
The cookie jar is still on her desk, still half-full. Not half-empty. Never half-empty. Mrs. Landingham, Delores, would never let her cookie jar be half-empty.  
  
But she's not here any longer to ration the cookies, to mete them out to the people who really deserve them. I guess, as her assistant, that's my job now.  
  
It's all my job now. I mean, when Delores went to New Hampshire last year to be with her best friend on her sickbed, I took care of things, but this... this is so much more. This is so utterly and completely irreversible.  
  
Mrs. Landingham is dead.  
  
Her funeral was today.  
  
It was a beautiful service.  
  
She would have been proud.  
  
But now... now, I have to step into her shoes until the President finds someone else. And then, he will cast me aside like a such-worn glove.  
  
I wish none of this had happened.  
  
I can't bake cookies. I can't take her place.  
  
What... what am I going to do?  
  
Well, first thing's first: I'm going to eat a sacred cookie, then fill the jar again.  
  
She would never let it go empty.  
  
And neither will I.  
  
~~~~  
The moon of the night  
Will sweetly protect us  
The moon of the night  
Will sweetly protect us...  
~~~~  
  
I don't know what's going through his head right now, and I'm not sure I want to know. He's closed himself off to everyone.  
  
My husband, Mr. Secret-keeper, just has to have another one. Another secret to poison his soul. I wish he would just talk to me... I wish he would take me aside and just talk to me.  
  
I wonder what he said in there. I know he was pissed as hell, I could see it in the set of his mouth, the tense gleam in his eyes. He was going to do some railing. But I wonder what he said.  
  
She was a good woman, even if she did hate my guts at first. Delores was like Jed's big old guard dog of a sister, and she never faltered from that post. Never once.  
  
She was there for him when Leo, the girls, and I couldn't be. She never left his side for a moment. And now...  
  
Now, look what's happening, where we're going.  
  
We're heading into the abyss, without her to protect him. Without her guidance.  
  
What did you say to God, Jed?  
  
Will you ever tell you wife? Will you ever tell me what was so horrible you couldn't say it in front of me, and Leo, and...  
  
You cursed him.  
  
And now... now we'll see if he curses you in return.  
  
Once more into the breach, my love.  
  
~~~~  
The night falls  
And it is there  
It reigns over the whole sky.  
It will watch us with kindness  
Illuminating the evening...  
~~~~  
  
When I said the new slogan was "bring it on", I didn't mean for...  
  
Someone in the cosmic swing of things really has a twisted sense of humor.  
  
That decision had to be made - whether or not Bartlet would run again, whether or not Mrs. Bartlet - Dr. Bartlet - would step back and let the President admit to the world that he had lied to them all, had perpetrated the biggest fraud in the White House since...  
  
And now...  
  
I only vaguely knew Mrs. Landingham. I think she gave me a cookie once. But that's beside the point.  
  
I know she held some kind of psychological sway over him, because since the accident, he's just been... withdrawn, bitter... hostile. Extremely hostile.  
  
Bring it on.  
  
Just bring on the shit. We're more than ready, and if we're not...  
  
If we're not, we will be.  
  
I will light a candle in her memory, and pray that she comes back to guide him, because he's going to need it.  
  
Bring it on.  
  
~~~~  
The moon of the night  
Will sweetly protect us  
The moon of the night  
Will sweetly protect us...  
~~~~  
  
Two blows in two days. It took two blows to shatter my carefully cultivated image that everything in the White House was just going great now that the shooting was being pushed back into the back of everyone's minds.  
  
But no, once again, Margaret, your eyes only deceive you.  
  
Mrs. Landingham died in her new car - her beautiful new car she took me along to help her pick out. So much for Consumer Reports and their safety checklists, eh? She died in a futile way, hit by a drunk driver...  
  
I'm never ever having another drink in my life. Not after this. It's too much.  
  
And then... then Leo told me about the President's MS. Sagittarius. The whole story, the whole lie of omission came pouring out, and... There's a sense of irony in that they chose Sagittarius for the code word. It's Mrs. Bartlet's astrological sign.  
  
But not all of this disaster can be blamed on Abbey, or the President.  
  
Or anyone else.  
  
But now... with these two things hanging over our heads, Donna and I enter the State Department and wait for the announcement our bosses had denied us.  
  
Will he... won't he...  
  
I feel the anxious tension of the room, especially from Donna and myself. We're a bundle of nerves.  
  
Surely he won't push aside Delores's teachings so easily and not...  
  
What is he doing? He's put his hands in his pockets. His soaking wet wool pants...  
  
And he smiled!  
  
He smiled.  
  
Maybe I can start building some of those illusions again.  
  
~~~~  
The moon will not be awake  
It will flee  
The moon will vanish...  
~~~~  
  
He didn't call on Altman. Oh God, he wants... he wants to be asked about reelection. He wants to tell them that...  
  
That we're all cowards, out of a job.  
  
Well, maybe not cowards. Cowards is too strong of a description.  
  
He wants to tell them that we're too tired to fight back. That it's so futile a fight that we couldn't possibly win it.  
  
I should have taken that stupid lifeboat, but blame it on my mother. She taught me that loyalty is not something that can be bought, transferred, or denied. And I am loyal to the best man to ever stand in the White House.  
  
"Watch this," Leo tells me.  
  
I'm watching. I'm watching him...  
  
And I see something behind him. I'm going crazy, I have to be.   
  
I see Mrs. Delores Landingham standing behind him, her hands firmly planted on his shoulders, as if urging him on.  
  
But she's dead, and I'm hallucinating. I blink, and she's gone - just more proof.  
  
Bring it on.  
  
Just get it over with. Tell the world...  
  
And he put his hands in his pockets.  
  
And smiled.  
  
Watch this, indeed.  
  
  
  
Finis  



End file.
